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How can we make air conditioners more efficient? [video]

371 points by zeristor 5y ago

zeristor 5y ago
Of course they key thing is to get data from commercially available systems, but a 33% saving could be huge deal. For air conditioning, fridges, ground source heat pumps. https://www.magtor.tech/ https://www.magtor.tech/
- cogman10 5y ago
  Cutting the cold crank power requirement to 0 is also pretty nice. It means ACs with this thing would play nicely with solar/battery systems as they wouldn't require big current spikes to start.
  - zeristor 5y ago
    Yes, it’s mentioned that that can peak at five times the running load to get it started.
    - GekkePrutser 5y ago
      Even more. My simple 100W fridge shows peaks up to 3000W when it switches on. Very short but sometimes my Shelly EM catches them (and messes up my graphs :) ). I can also see the lights dim a bit when that happens. Even if it works I'm not going to buy a new fridge just for that though. Manufacturing a whole new fridge will be worse for the environment than running this for many years especially on green power. However when it does go, it would be nice to have.
trhway 5y ago
sound similar to free-piston vs. crank-shaft in case of ICE engines.
- mianos 5y ago
  Pretty much. And the answers to all the technical questions are the same BS paste: "Response from Magtor CTO :"
OJFord 5y ago
I'm going to go out on a limb and assume 'a revolutionary solution' is not going to come from '(youtube.com)'...
- jffry 5y ago
  Please take a moment to go out on a limb and read the video description or watch the video. The video is discussing a new technology from a company which purports to have come up with a more efficient way of compressing refrigerant in cooling systems, https://www.magtor.tech https://www.magtor.tech
  - OJFord 5y ago
    Fair enough, I stand corrected. I think your link would've been a better submission than just the video specifically. The submission lacks '[video]' and took me a couple of seconds to decide it wasn't for me, just in terms of presentation style even after you made it more appealing.
    - OJFord 5y ago
      Can no longer edit, but the submission has been updated to remove the silly click-baiting ('revolutionary'), and to add '[video]'... I don't know if the flaggers and down-voters missed the earlier title so lack context, or what, but it's sorted now - I take no issue with the current title 'How can we make air conditioners more efficient? [video]', that's not what my comments above are referring to.
- mhh__ 5y ago
  Well, the first YouTube video was published on YouTube and that was pretty influential
  - OJFord 5y ago
    Was it? I don't even know what it was. YouTube itself is.. well it's at least arguable that it was revolutionary, but that's the platform, not whatever the first video was, if there even was a meaningful first (wouldn't you seed it with as much as you could from other sources?).
saltedonion 5y ago
So what is the approximate overall efficiency of this system now? Is there still viable room for improvement after this 33% increase?
re 5y ago
The meat about the new technology starts at about 4:30 into the video, after some background on the history of A/C and how it works. > Most modern compressors and pumps use rotary motors to shove a fluid from A to B inside a chamber, but rotary motors can lose as much as 30 percent of their output when they're asked to convert their rotary motion into linear motion required by compressors and pumps. That conversion is done by a crankshaft and once a crankshaft is in the system you get some friction losses but more importantly you get diminished efficiency because you're only getting maximum shove force in the middle of the piston stroke. The start and end of the stroke are both dead points where zero force is available to do any useful work. In a compression task you really want the maximum force to be applied at the end of the stroke not the minimum force. Overcoming these inertia forces every time the motor starts up requires a big spike in power demand which can be as much as five times the motor's normal operating consumption. > The technology that Magtor have been quietly developing for over a decade now is a magnetically driven linear motor that completely eliminates the need for a crankshaft and achieves far higher operating efficiency as a result. Here's how it works. A fixed electromagnet stator sits at the centre of the motor. On either side of that are magnetic plates that are connected to each other via a shaft that runs through the middle of the stator. That connection effectively turns the two magnetic plates into a single moving part. As a voltage is applied across the electromagnet its polarity attracts the magnetic plate at one end and repels the magnetic plate at the other end. But because it's an electromagnet its polarity is changing 50 or 60 times a second as a result of the alternating current flowing through the copper windings. [...] > You also avoid that costly power spike at start up as well. Because there's negligible mechanical inertia to overcome, as soon as an electrical current is applied the movement caused by magnetic attraction and repulsion can get going instantaneously. And on top of all that, Magtor have developed a very smart additional element that optimizes the motive power provided by the magnetic flux of the system. [...] In this working example a magtopressor is connected to a five-litre tank of air. Magtor's tests have shown that their device, which is smaller and lighter than a traditional reciprocating piston air compressor, can pressurize a cylinder 38% faster while consuming 33% percent less electricity. (emphasis added)
- makomk 5y ago
  I'm pretty sure some of the more high-end fridge compressors used by companies like LG already work more or less like this, with marginal efficiency gains but some improvement in noise.
AussieWog93 5y ago
Impressive tech, but I wonder how much power we could save if we just started putting doors in living rooms.
- gpm 5y ago
  How would doors in livings rooms save power?
  - AussieWog93 5y ago
    Maybe it's an Aussie thing, but most air conditioners I've seen are based in the living room. Most modern living rooms also don't have doors, meaning that these air conditioners are cooling 3-4x the volume of air that the owner actually wants them to. At best, this wastes power. At worst, this wastes power and means the one room you actually want to cool doesn't get cooled properly. I've lived in a unit with a door in the same room as a split system and it was amazing. The room would become completely cool in around 5 minutes, then the compressor would shut off and run for maybe 2 minutes every 15 minutes or so to maintain this cool temperature.
    - gpm 5y ago
      Canadian (Toronto) here, pretty much every air conditioner I've seen uses the same forced-air vent system as the furnace, and thus has outputs to every room of the house. Definitely sounds regional, but also we air condition the entire house so we aren't winning the efficiency war here.
      - thrdbndndn 5y ago
        In my country (and most of East Asian countries I have been, like China, Japan, etc.) residential ACs are mostly in individual rooms (like this: https://moderndiplomacy.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/air-condition-repair.jpg https://moderndiplomacy.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/air-co... ) . You would have one for the living room, one for each bedroom, etc. Central HVAC exists, but 90%+ homes don't have them. It's not as convenient and comfortable (one common problem older houses have is that there is no AC in kitchen) but the energy cost difference compared to the norm in the North America is night and day (the houses are significantly smaller here too).
jcims 5y ago
Unfortunately the explanation of the A/C fluid cycle is haphazard and the description of how forces relate to crankshaft position is completely wrong. The crankshaft actually applies maximum force to the piston while approaching top and bottom dead center, when the mechanical advantage is greatest, and the least at mid stroke, where the torque of the motor is most directly opposed by the pressure of the gas against the face of the piston. This is good, however, because it marries well to the available power through an alternating current system. The design described does seem to have fewer moving parts, which is good. But the advantage of linear vs rotary motion with respect to forces seems sketchy. Field strength in the linear system is likely to vary across the travel and would still need to be synchronized to the alternating current to prevent motor stalls. (Edit 50 of this comment: this effect is actually illustrated directly in the video here: https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=348 https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=348 Imagine the field lines directly correlate with force applied, and mentally plot the quantity of field lines over time as you watch the animation. Turns out it looks precisely like the force chart of a rotary compressor.) The primary advantage of this pump, to me, seems to be reduced weight/complexity and lower friction losses. For it to operate with low starting load it would likely need to essentially vibrate its way to full travel (confirmed at 7:47 in the video), something rotary compressors can’t really do. If you try to restart rotary compressors too quickly after stopping, the high head pressure will stall the motor. This causes it to effectively be a dead short minus winding resistance, pulling much more current than average (known as LRA or locked rotor amps) with no cooling. This will heat the motor quickly until it thermally trips or burns up. This is why you will frequently see restart delays in A/C systems. For what its worth, scroll compressors have been around forever and share some of these advantages, but aren’t dominant in the industry because of the additional complexity in manufacturing. They have an additional advantage of somewhat continous output pressure, which *significantly* reduces ambient noise and vibration. They also have fewer moving parts and are generally more reliable. All of these advantages convey to standard air compressors by the way, something I'm a little surprised they didn't mention.
- phnofive 5y ago
  You sound like you have expertise, so could you have a look at his patents? I couldn't make much of them other than they looked familiar in some aspects and impractical/impossible in others: https://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=0&f=S&l=50&d=PTXT&RS=IN%2F%22helmreich%22&Refine=Refine+Search&Query=IN%2F%22helmreich%22+AND+IN%2F%22martin%22 https://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=... I assume that this is pretty common in trying to improve linear motors - I am trying to get my hands on a small one to drive an air pump and it's just inscrutable to me.
fernly 5y ago
If this[1] is the "Magtor" mentioned, they say nothing at all about this tech on their website, that I can find. [1] http://magtor.com/ http://magtor.com/
- phnofive 5y ago
  Replying elsewhere, but here's a USPTO link on the inventor: https://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=0&f=S&l=50&d=PTXT&RS=IN%2F%22helmreich%22&Refine=Refine+Search&Query=IN%2F%22helmreich%22+AND+IN%2F%22martin%22 https://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=...
- jf 5y ago
  From another comment in this thread, it looks like the site is: https://www.magtor.tech/ https://www.magtor.tech/
- fernly 5y ago
  It's magtor.tech as shown in the next post.
tuatoru 5y ago
I don't get it. This is just a solenoid. Solenoids have high "start-up" (saturation) currents. Using the inertia of the plate mass at the end of each stroke is clever though. I'd have thought a rotary electric motor connected to a rotary compressor would be quieter and easier to design the bearings for, and would operate in a more steady-state regime, so be more reliable. You also don't need the valve where the fluid from the two sides meets up, avoiding that efficiency loss. I think the latest fridges (which are also air conditioners) use rotary compression. Modern fridges and industrial electric motors have had "soft start" circuits in them for at least a decade. The start-up current thing is a non-issue.
- flavius29663 5y ago
  Existing fridge compressors are ridiculously reliable. They are a close circuit, self lubricating motors. My grandma's fridge from the 70s was still running strong when we threw it out a few years ago. I didn't quite understood how that new design is more reliable or serviceable? The closed compressors are literally zero maintenance. Also, the vibrations of that thing will tear itself apart quite fast, just look at their own promotional video: the pipes themselves cannot possibly last long with such vibrations: https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=471 https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=471
hamburgerwah 5y ago
Here is what will happen with this technology... nothing. The company is an IP play where they have locked up this concept in IP and will try and force it on jurisdictions by various means of legislation to ensure they can get the highest prices possible for said IP. Incumbents will resist choosing to continue with current public domain technology. In 30 years when the IP expires it might possibly come into more common use. The current IP regimes are a complete disaster and are hamstringing human progress. PS: Also scroll compressors are substantially more energy efficient than rotary and various means of staging is even more efficient yet.
- joshuaissac 5y ago
  > will try and force it on jurisdictions by various means of legislation Have they said this is their strategy? There are IP licensors (like ARM and the Fraunhofer Society) that sell licences to their IP without trying to force jurisdictions to adopt their technology. > Incumbents will resist choosing to continue with current public domain technology This would depend on the pricing of the IP licences and the competition within the market. If the licences are cheap enough and the market competitive enough that using this tech would provide an advantage, then incumbents would license it.
  - colechristensen 5y ago
    ARM sells... "intellectual property" that I might try to come up with a distinguishing definition from the IP of "one clever idea I want a monopoly on for a while". A lot of IP boils down to an idea that you could describe in an elevator and a few good engineers could turn into a product in a few hours to a year. ARM sells things that represent... thousands? hundreds of thousands? of engineer-years. You can't just whip that up in a short time, it totally makes sense to pay someone else for their trouble to make something... but if you wanted to and had a billion dollars to spare, sure you could do it yourself. The problem with "I thought of it first" IP protections is the phenomenon of simultaneous discovery. A whole lot of ideas just have their time come, and tend to have multiple people working on them and coming to similar results in short periods. Making this a race and letting the winner sell out to groups that either want to extract rent out of the idea or to hide it in a safe to prevent competition for 30 years is not conducive to progress.
MauranKilom 5y ago
Isn't the video inaccurate about the force of current pumps near maximum compression? The power put into the system by the motor is constant throughout the entire revolution. It follows that, since the piston moves slower near maximum compression, force increases (since power = force * speed). This is also intuitively the case: You need much more force to push back the piston (against a constant motor torque) near its apex because the moment arm of the crank shaft gets smaller and smaller. Yes, at the maximum compression point the force is not well-defined. In a sense it is infinite (you could not actually turn the rotor by pushing on the piston). But certainly not zero. I'm struggling to understand what the creator might have meant instead. It's not work or power (which, again, is constant). The rotary motion works, if anything, in favor of the system, as the force gets larger with compression (past the midway point). Is there some quantity I'm missing? Maybe something to do with gas laws? I'm also skeptical about the illustration with the additional magnets to contain the magnetic field lines. As drawn, that would not work for AC as the magnetic field would be the wrong way around half the time. Maybe they just use extra iron to shape the field - but that is extremely far from being innovative and more like electrical engineering 101. It could well be that I'm missing something, but overall this video had multiple strange explanations that lower my confidence in the overall accuracy of the reporting...
Confiks 5y ago
Do note that Magtor is currently only claiming to be able to compress air, not air conditioning fluids / refrigerants. They add that "[a]lthough air compression is a first milestone for Magtor, the medium-term goal is to bring Magtor efficiencies to climate control engineering allowing products such as fridges, heat pumps and air conditioning units to become 30+% more efficient" [1]. It's hard to verify more on the design. They offer a lot of explanation and tests, but no independent review is given. Main question on YouTube about scrolling compressors (used in newer fridges) is anwered a bit vaguely [2]. The patent portfolio page is very grandiose [3] but doesn't care to link anything. A quick search doesn't turn up much to do with air or fluid compression, only "Magnet device comprising stators and translators" [4] and similar, which don't mention compression at all. [1] https://www.magtor.tech/who-we-are/ https://www.magtor.tech/who-we-are/ [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TFiL5BM3ss&lc=UgxHEJkjlZ9fZLvLz4t4AaABAg.9RLpfTDalnh9RMOMcaz2cs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TFiL5BM3ss&lc=UgxHEJkjlZ9fZ... [3] https://www.magtor.tech/intellectual-property/ https://www.magtor.tech/intellectual-property/ [4] https://patents.google.com/patent/US10943721B2 https://patents.google.com/patent/US10943721B2
- nashashmi 5y ago
  How can something like a rapid compressor generate SO much heat AND transfer it so quickly. Isn’t there some kind of time delay in both generation and transfer?
jedberg 5y ago
Is this just an ad for a company trying to patent their technology?
robocat 5y ago
They appear not to be developing the compressors themselves, but instead are trying to license their IP. From their ‘Who are we’ page[1], their Director of Production “oversees the production of the Magtopressor Demonstrators”, so not really production per se. The focus on worldwide patents and number of patents in the videos is also noticeable. [1] https://www.magtor.tech/who-we-are/#our-key-personnel https://www.magtor.tech/who-we-are/#our-key-personnel
woleium 5y ago
Heh, title should be "A non-revolutionary solution"
mrfusion 5y ago
Btw what’s the story with teslas octovalve? Does that add a lot of efficiency to their heat pumps?
- stephen_g 5y ago
  From reading some links from here, I don't think so. Despite the breathless amazement of the writers, it doesn't seem to really be an innovation in heat pumps itself, it's just doing things in a way that's much more efficient than Tesla's previous heating/cooling systems...
swamp_gas 5y ago
Some ACs are already 33% more efficient. https://www.pickhvac.com/faq/what-is-the-best-seer/ https://www.pickhvac.com/faq/what-is-the-best-seer/
gpm 5y ago
This comment by the author on youtube is worth reading: Attempt at direct linking: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TFiL5BM3ss&lc=UgzdQZ_jgrbde4i1Zs94AaABAg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TFiL5BM3ss&lc=UgzdQZ_jgrbde... --- Context (post by Ed Williams) Most residential (and many commercial) AC units, refrigerators, heat pump and such use scroll compressors. Yes, they have a startup in rush, but I'd be interested in seeing efficiency of this tech versus current scroll compressors. --- Post by "Just Have a Think" (the creator) Response from Magtor CTO : There are many types of compressor in use and the industry somewhat specialises within particular technologies based on the power requirements, type of applications, manufacturing costs, end product costs, etc. Regarding efficiency of scroll vs reciprocating compressors, not all sources agree but the trend is that scroll compressors are at least slightly more efficient, based on operating conditions… There is this interesting white paper from Schneider Electric, “The different types of cooling compressors” https://download.schneider-electric.com/files?p_Doc_Ref=SPD_VAVR-AE7T7G_EN https://download.schneider-electric.com/files?p_Doc_Ref=SPD_... and I also found this study: “Comparison of hermetic scroll and reciprocating compressors operating under varying refrigerant charge and load” at https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=2517&context=icec https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=http...
poorjohnmacafee 5y ago
FYI this is an advert. Not just in resemblance to an infomercial but the youtube presenter is reaching out and quoting CTO of the company as responses to youtuber questions in comments.
- fastball 5y ago
  Fairly certain YouTube requires you to disclose paid-for adverts now.
  - elil17 5y ago
    Fairly certain humans have been breaking rules almost as long as we’ve been making them.
    - fastball 5y ago
      Sure, but it would be very unlikely in this particular case, given that YT is very trigger happy when it comes to violations and YT is the main source of his livelihood.
- filleokus 5y ago
  I regularly watch this channel and I honestly believe his claims of independence (no revenue from any kind of sponsorships or adverts, just from Patreons). I think he simply want to be helpful for his audience and forward questions/responses if he has the chance to do so. Overall I like his content, he is usually fairly technical and realistic about the prospect of things he cover. He has also has done some deep dives in e.g how to calculate levelized cost of energy to help analyse/compare different new inovations he showcase on the channel. But sometimes I guess it can be slightly too pop-sciencey, reminding me (both in a good and bad way) of the glossy science magazines of my youth. Extrapolating barley lab bench-viable results to full scale production, with very optimistic timelines etc.
  - mda 5y ago
    Even if this is not an advert, he could have done better research and put a more balanced view. Are there prior work similar to this? What are the risks for the companies approach? Will it really provide 30% better efficiency? In current form this indeed looks like an advert, whether intentional or not.
everybodyknows 5y ago
This is a variation on a long-established linear-motor compressor design, for sale in these products: https://engelcoolers.com/collections/powered-fridge-freezers https://engelcoolers.com/collections/powered-fridge-freezers Google "Sawafuji Swing Compressor".
basicplus2 5y ago
The biggest inefficiencies come from combining heating and cooling in the one unit. if you buy a airconditiiner that only cools (or only heats) it can be aything from 3 to 5 times more efficient than a reverse cycle type.
- tjmc 5y ago
  Can you please link to datasheets that verify this because I haven't seen these discrepancies in smaller (split) systems.
iamgopal 5y ago
Years ago, I did try to built on similar concept but instead using reluctance for further reducing hysteresis losses. Due to lower power density of such system the size of the compressor was increased by about 2 times.
ekianjo 5y ago
Protected by patents = will get no traction whatsoever.
fake-name 5y ago
How did this get a patent? This is just an linear piston pump [1][2]. You can literally buy fish tank air pumps that use this exact mechanism [3]. The only thing mildly novel here is that they're driving it both directions via magnets & more complex drive electronics. Most of the commercial versions just use a steel piston, and single-direction actuation because they can then run the electromagnet directly off mains AC to get the cycling action. 1: https://www.techmagpm.com/en/linear-piston/ https://www.techmagpm.com/en/linear-piston/ 2: https://www.nitto-kohki.eu/en/operating-principles-en/linear-piston-pumps.html https://www.nitto-kohki.eu/en/operating-principles-en/linear... 3: https://www.jehmco.com/html/central_air_pumps.html https://www.jehmco.com/html/central_air_pumps.html
baybal2 5y ago
LG been making linear piston compressors for mass market for more than a decade. The true breakthrough here will happen with solid state gas compressors. Solid state compressors already approach, or pass 50% efficiency — something only possible in very large, staged, centrifugal compressors for large AC systems. A solid state compressor, unlike that, will be equally efficient regardless the size.
SevenSigs 5y ago
if your AC is ~10 years old... just replace it and you will probably get > 33% efficiency gains
supperburg 5y ago
This is unmitigated bullshit and probably sponsored by the vapor ware company that is making this thing. Just add more insulation and some solar panels.
sargun 5y ago
Why wouldn't they use scroll compressors?
cryptonector 5y ago
There's an internal combustion engine that works on roughly the opposite as this magtor compressor: a pair of opposing pistons moving the connecting rod linearly to drive a linear electric generator. I can't remember the name of it.
hellgas00 5y ago
LG uses linear compressors in their fridges, very similar to this design and they have been out for years. They generally fail after only a few years, terrible reliability in comparison to a piston compressor.
- gpapilion 5y ago
  Mine failed within 5 years, and this seems to be a common thread among LG owners.
bin_bash 5y ago
I’m surprised this wasn’t about Exergyn which is far more interesting tech: https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2021/07/21/a-new-green-air-conditioning-system-manages-without-nasty-gases https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2021/07/21/...
- Abishek_Muthian 5y ago
  I too thought the video was about Exergyn, I was pleasantly surprised when I read the Economist coverage on them. It's not like we come across breakthrough technology which is cheaper, efficient and planet friendly. It is supposedly 30-40% cheaper than current ACs and being solid-state stack it's definitely more efficient(Not sure how it compares with the calimed efficiency of Magtor).
kova12 5y ago
Jeezus, what a bunch of wankers. Just stop screwing around and get nuclear energy prioritized already. Solve energy crisis and global warming all at the same time. Only loser is exxon-mobil, but I can live with that
elil17 5y ago
Clever design, perhaps. However, it only applies to small, residential AC. Commercial systems use more efficient designs already, such as screw compressors. Also, good luck using this with a turbine - many of the largest compressors directly driven by gas or steam turbines, which are way more efficient than electric motors because they eliminate inefficiencies associated with electric generation and distribution.
sandreas 5y ago
Well, the idea behind this solves ONE problem of the whole process... here is an alternative, that rethinks the whole process and already is used in many german projects: https://fahrenheit.cool/en/ https://fahrenheit.cool/en/
nobrains 5y ago
Analogy wise, this seems like AC (alternating current) instead of DC (direct current), but for compression motors. (Edit: But only until the unit that combines both the sides and makes it back to DC (still using analogy) back again)
TaylorAlexander 5y ago
If anyone is curious I built some brushless linear motors in 2011 and I have recently put some relevant code and background docs on GitHub. https://github.com/tlalexander/open_linear_motor https://github.com/tlalexander/open_linear_motor
atoav 5y ago
IMO the most important thing to make air conditioners more efficient is to design, build and modify buildings in such a way they do the heavy lifting passively. This means also we need to avoid building idiotic things like sun-facing glas fronts etc. We have to stop pretending we are going to save the day by making AC units (or any other thermal machine) a few percentage points more efficient — because this is peanuts and nowhere near the amount of efficiency needed to grant humanities survival on earth. The best AC unit is the one that you don't need.
- KozmoNau7 5y ago
  Exactly! We need more efficiency, and heat pumps/air conditioners are already very efficient at what they do. Of course further efficiency improvements are welcome, but they are small gains. We need to look at where big gains can be made, and improving the thermal efficiency and air circulation of buildings holds a lot of promise. You don't have to go full passivhaus, even just improved insulation, double/triple-layer glass, sun shades and well-placed foliage to provide shade can net much larger improvements than some tweaks to AC design.
- dzhiurgis 5y ago
  It's probably cheaper to put AC + solar panels in each home than rebuild all of them...
  - atoav 5y ago
    Depends what costs you factor in down the line. E.g. I remember reading a study about Paris, that looked at the impact widespread AC use would have on the ambient temperature of the city. The optimistic guess was a rise of about 5°. Where I live (Central Europe) air conditions are the total exception. Adding AC to flats is rarely ever done, thermal insulation much, much more often, even in old buildings. Maybe this is because the winters also get cold so thermal insulation has the extra pro of reducing the heating bill.
    - dzhiurgis 5y ago
      AC is somewhat cheap of source of heat in winter too, provided your system is scaled enough.
toxik 5y ago
Interesting nerdsnipe. Tell people (incorrectly) how an AC system works, then segue into a full-blown ad piece for some "new" tech.
timonoko 5y ago
Apropos: Helsinki has never experienced heatwave longer than 5 days (above 25°C). Last summer it was phucking 45 days. However the bottom temperature of the near-by Baltic Sea is -4°C. I know this because I was hunting for halibut. There is already a separate system which refrigerates government offices from the Baltic Sea. I would suggest is to use the system to cool all homes by using the central heating system. All you need is lower is temperature to 15°C in those pipes.
- ajnin 5y ago
  What would be the impact of all that heat on sea life and fishing activities ? Also, as we tend to learn the hard way, natural resources are finite. How big of a heatsink is the bottom of the Baltic sea ? For how long could you cool all of Helsinki's homes per, say 1˚C temperature increase ?
  - timonoko 5y ago
    No worry. All life in the the deeps is all ready gone. This is because of lack of oxygen and some chemicals, like phosphors mostly from from agriculture.
Gravityloss 5y ago
One point in the presentation is not correct. This is instead correct: the maximum force occurs at minimum speed at the top and bottom of the stroke. The minimum force and maximum speed of piston occur mid-stroke. https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=284 https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=284
- LeifCarrotson 5y ago
  You have to distinguish between the available force that the constant-torque motor is able to produce and the actual force that is exerted on the working fluid by the piston. Yes, the crankshaft confers the greatest mechanical advantage at the top and bottom of the stroke; that's an excellent observation. The position vs time plot of a crankshaft follows a sine wave, the velocity (as a derivative of position) follows a cosine, and the acceleration available from a constant input torque follows the derivative of the position, again a sine wave. However, this available force does not meant that the exerted force at the top of the stroke is high, as it needs a reactive force to work against. This force is mostly provided by the fluid pressure, rather than by a velocity-dependent force like friction. At the top of stroke, the gas is not under significant compression, so it takes minimal force to move the piston. Near the bottom of the stroke, when the gas is maximally compressed, there is maximum force on the piston. When the pressure exceeds the output of the compressor, the air begins to exit through the check valve. Another complicating factor is that there are typically two pistons on the same crankshaft, so as the piston returns the gas remaining in the cylinder is working with the motor. The final and most complicated part of the problem is that the whole point is that the gas being compressed is not an ideal Hooke's law spring where PV = constant, it's undergoing adibatic compression, where P x V x gamma = constant, where gamma is the specific heat of the refrigerant, and the temperature changes through the compression. You can improve your intuitive understanding of these relationships with an ordinary bike pump and the bike's pedals. When the pump is fully up, there's little resistance, you can feel the force increase when it's almost at the bottom, and you can feel and hear the air going into the tire for a short length of the stroke at the bottom. Likewise, pushing vertically on the pedals (avoid pushing forward or pawing backwards) does the same thing as a crankshaft.
smnscu 5y ago
The fact that the video wasn't from Technology Connections was both surprising and disappointing. Great share though! I wish ACs and heat pumps were more common in the UK, though I understand why they aren't (yet! I expect an AC installing craze in the next couple of years).
adflux 5y ago
I have a single hose AC (renting right now). did some research on how to improve the efficiency of the unit. I ran into this report by the australian government: https://www.energyrating.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-06/decision-ris-air-conditioners.pdf https://www.energyrating.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-06/... Adding a second hose to a single hose AC can improve effiency by around 100%... This is because portable air conditioners are tested differently to other air conditioners. "The DoE found the addition of a second duct that uses outdoor air to cool the condenser would yield an efficiency gain of 103 per cent for a retail price increase of around US$8 (from US$534 to US$542)—a price/efficiency ratio of 1:103 (i.e. a one per cent increase in price provides a 103 per cent increase in efficiency). Because double duct portables are no longer available on the Australian and New Zealand markets, suppliers are unable to communicate their benefits compared with single duct products. The existing energy efficiency regulations on portable air conditioners appear to have had the perverse effect of removing the more energy efficient product (double duct portables) from the market, while encouraging the marketing of single duct portables, by allowing unverified claims to be made about the effectiveness and efficiency of these products. This RIS considers options to resolve this perverse situatio" "The single duct portable’s performance information is likely to have been obtained from a test that measured the cold air produced. Fixed air conditioners, conversely, are tested to measure their cooling effect on an enclosed space. While a single duct portable may blow cold air onto a person, if its performance was tested in the same way as a fixed air conditioner, it could have a net heating effect on the room it was supposed to cool."
thorin 5y ago
Live in areas that don't need air conditioning :-) Coming from UK / Europe I'm always surprised by the number of people in the US and of course Asia that are totally dependent on aircon.
- oblio 5y ago
  Yup, let's abandon 10-20% of the globe, and maybe 30% soon, as global warming ramps up. That's going to be quick, easy and politically viable.
  - thorin 5y ago
    Maybe forcing buildings to be created in such a way to minimize aircon and be more energy efficient would be helpful rather than relying on powered devices to fix the problem in place. I could deal with the 1 or 2 weeks a year it might be might to nice to have aircon where I live. Building in excessively Dubai for example seems crazy to me.
    - oblio 5y ago
      I agree with you, but the global tendency is towards bigger and harder to heat/cool houses, spread apart (so again, no shared heating/cooling), whenever living standards improve. People seem to be living in crowded cities just because they're forced (jobs are nearby, apartments are generally cheaper than apartments because they're generally smaller, etc). Desert environment should definitely be super high density and possibly largely underground in my opinion. Things don't seem to be moving that way, though.
      - thorin 5y ago
        I'd struggle to live somewhere where you have to spend most of your time indoors in and air conditioned environment anyway, but this doesn't seem to bother a lot of people, I guess they are used to it. If we carry on this way maybe colonizing other planets won't seem so bad...
uCantCauseUCant 5y ago
The answers is - reservoirs.. earth cools itself at night, we need to pump the heat into the night sky and store the cold in salt reservoirs.
robbmorganf 5y ago
I'll give it to them that the solution is an elegant reduction in parts count. It's just a shame that they compare it to a straw man and exaggerate the benefits. "It solves this problem, and this one, and this one" but modern compressors don't suffer most of those. Other sibling comments have good specific qualms, so I won't duplicate them. That said, I'm glad people play around with new designs. That's how innovation works. I just wish investors would be satisfied with "we're trying a reasonable alternative design to look at benefits" rather than requiring "the old design is a dinosaur, and our design solves every problem under the sun"
xondono 5y ago
I don't understand what is innovative or new about this, and I'm highly dubious of the quoted numbers. "33% more efficient" is repeated in several company documents and videos, but I can't find the baseline for that measurement.
_nalply 5y ago
Additionally air conditioners should transfer heat to tap water, not outside air. Water as a medium to discard heat is more efficient. There are downsides to this: wasted tap water and hot sewers. Probably certain municipalities should disallow such air conditioner water heaters except to make hot water for showering and bathing. Also see: https://www.hotspotenergy.com/air-conditioner-water-heaters/ACWH-FAQ.php https://www.hotspotenergy.com/air-conditioner-water-heaters/...
londons_explore 5y ago
For efficient AC and heat pump systems, we need to invent a compressor which is close-to isothermal rather than close-to adiabatic. And we need to switch to pressure change rather than phase change systems. That pretty much means the compressor needs to be built into the 'condensor'. The closest we get to today is two stage compressors - where you compress a bit, cool the gas, then compress some more. But we need to get to 50 stage compressors - where we compress slightly, then cool, and repeat. Also, we will need to switch out the pressure regulating orifice for a turboexpander to recuperate the energy which would otherwise be lost letting something high pressure become low pressure. All these add complexity and cost, but ultimately will be needed to make efficient enough systems when energy is more expensive in a carbon-free world.

371 points by zeristor 5y ago

Of course they key thing is to get data from commercially available systems, but a 33% saving could be huge deal. For air conditioning, fridges, ground source heat pumps. https://www.magtor.tech/ https://www.magtor.tech/

cogman10 5y ago
Cutting the cold crank power requirement to 0 is also pretty nice. It means ACs with this thing would play nicely with solar/battery systems as they wouldn't require big current spikes to start.
- zeristor 5y ago
  Yes, it’s mentioned that that can peak at five times the running load to get it started.
  - GekkePrutser 5y ago
    Even more. My simple 100W fridge shows peaks up to 3000W when it switches on. Very short but sometimes my Shelly EM catches them (and messes up my graphs :) ). I can also see the lights dim a bit when that happens. Even if it works I'm not going to buy a new fridge just for that though. Manufacturing a whole new fridge will be worse for the environment than running this for many years especially on green power. However when it does go, it would be nice to have.

trhway 5y ago

sound similar to free-piston vs. crank-shaft in case of ICE engines.

mianos 5y ago
Pretty much. And the answers to all the technical questions are the same BS paste: "Response from Magtor CTO :"

OJFord 5y ago

I'm going to go out on a limb and assume 'a revolutionary solution' is not going to come from '(youtube.com)'...

jffry 5y ago
Please take a moment to go out on a limb and read the video description or watch the video. The video is discussing a new technology from a company which purports to have come up with a more efficient way of compressing refrigerant in cooling systems, https://www.magtor.tech https://www.magtor.tech
- OJFord 5y ago
  Fair enough, I stand corrected. I think your link would've been a better submission than just the video specifically. The submission lacks '[video]' and took me a couple of seconds to decide it wasn't for me, just in terms of presentation style even after you made it more appealing.
  - OJFord 5y ago
    Can no longer edit, but the submission has been updated to remove the silly click-baiting ('revolutionary'), and to add '[video]'... I don't know if the flaggers and down-voters missed the earlier title so lack context, or what, but it's sorted now - I take no issue with the current title 'How can we make air conditioners more efficient? [video]', that's not what my comments above are referring to.
mhh__ 5y ago
Well, the first YouTube video was published on YouTube and that was pretty influential
- OJFord 5y ago
  Was it? I don't even know what it was. YouTube itself is.. well it's at least arguable that it was revolutionary, but that's the platform, not whatever the first video was, if there even was a meaningful first (wouldn't you seed it with as much as you could from other sources?).

saltedonion 5y ago

So what is the approximate overall efficiency of this system now? Is there still viable room for improvement after this 33% increase?

re 5y ago

The meat about the new technology starts at about 4:30 into the video, after some background on the history of A/C and how it works. > Most modern compressors and pumps use rotary motors to shove a fluid from A to B inside a chamber, but rotary motors can lose as much as 30 percent of their output when they're asked to convert their rotary motion into linear motion required by compressors and pumps. That conversion is done by a crankshaft and once a crankshaft is in the system you get some friction losses but more importantly you get diminished efficiency because you're only getting maximum shove force in the middle of the piston stroke. The start and end of the stroke are both dead points where zero force is available to do any useful work. In a compression task you really want the maximum force to be applied at the end of the stroke not the minimum force. Overcoming these inertia forces every time the motor starts up requires a big spike in power demand which can be as much as five times the motor's normal operating consumption. > The technology that Magtor have been quietly developing for over a decade now is a magnetically driven linear motor that completely eliminates the need for a crankshaft and achieves far higher operating efficiency as a result. Here's how it works. A fixed electromagnet stator sits at the centre of the motor. On either side of that are magnetic plates that are connected to each other via a shaft that runs through the middle of the stator. That connection effectively turns the two magnetic plates into a single moving part. As a voltage is applied across the electromagnet its polarity attracts the magnetic plate at one end and repels the magnetic plate at the other end. But because it's an electromagnet its polarity is changing 50 or 60 times a second as a result of the alternating current flowing through the copper windings. [...] > You also avoid that costly power spike at start up as well. Because there's negligible mechanical inertia to overcome, as soon as an electrical current is applied the movement caused by magnetic attraction and repulsion can get going instantaneously. And on top of all that, Magtor have developed a very smart additional element that optimizes the motive power provided by the magnetic flux of the system. [...] In this working example a magtopressor is connected to a five-litre tank of air. Magtor's tests have shown that their device, which is smaller and lighter than a traditional reciprocating piston air compressor, can pressurize a cylinder 38% faster while consuming 33% percent less electricity. (emphasis added)

makomk 5y ago
I'm pretty sure some of the more high-end fridge compressors used by companies like LG already work more or less like this, with marginal efficiency gains but some improvement in noise.

AussieWog93 5y ago

Impressive tech, but I wonder how much power we could save if we just started putting doors in living rooms.

gpm 5y ago
How would doors in livings rooms save power?
- AussieWog93 5y ago
  Maybe it's an Aussie thing, but most air conditioners I've seen are based in the living room. Most modern living rooms also don't have doors, meaning that these air conditioners are cooling 3-4x the volume of air that the owner actually wants them to. At best, this wastes power. At worst, this wastes power and means the one room you actually want to cool doesn't get cooled properly. I've lived in a unit with a door in the same room as a split system and it was amazing. The room would become completely cool in around 5 minutes, then the compressor would shut off and run for maybe 2 minutes every 15 minutes or so to maintain this cool temperature.
  - gpm 5y ago
    Canadian (Toronto) here, pretty much every air conditioner I've seen uses the same forced-air vent system as the furnace, and thus has outputs to every room of the house. Definitely sounds regional, but also we air condition the entire house so we aren't winning the efficiency war here.
    - thrdbndndn 5y ago
      In my country (and most of East Asian countries I have been, like China, Japan, etc.) residential ACs are mostly in individual rooms (like this: https://moderndiplomacy.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/air-condition-repair.jpg https://moderndiplomacy.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/air-co... ) . You would have one for the living room, one for each bedroom, etc. Central HVAC exists, but 90%+ homes don't have them. It's not as convenient and comfortable (one common problem older houses have is that there is no AC in kitchen) but the energy cost difference compared to the norm in the North America is night and day (the houses are significantly smaller here too).

jcims 5y ago

Unfortunately the explanation of the A/C fluid cycle is haphazard and the description of how forces relate to crankshaft position is completely wrong. The crankshaft actually applies maximum force to the piston while approaching top and bottom dead center, when the mechanical advantage is greatest, and the least at mid stroke, where the torque of the motor is most directly opposed by the pressure of the gas against the face of the piston. This is good, however, because it marries well to the available power through an alternating current system. The design described does seem to have fewer moving parts, which is good. But the advantage of linear vs rotary motion with respect to forces seems sketchy. Field strength in the linear system is likely to vary across the travel and would still need to be synchronized to the alternating current to prevent motor stalls. (Edit 50 of this comment: this effect is actually illustrated directly in the video here: https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=348 https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=348 Imagine the field lines directly correlate with force applied, and mentally plot the quantity of field lines over time as you watch the animation. Turns out it looks precisely like the force chart of a rotary compressor.) The primary advantage of this pump, to me, seems to be reduced weight/complexity and lower friction losses. For it to operate with low starting load it would likely need to essentially vibrate its way to full travel (confirmed at 7:47 in the video), something rotary compressors can’t really do. If you try to restart rotary compressors too quickly after stopping, the high head pressure will stall the motor. This causes it to effectively be a dead short minus winding resistance, pulling much more current than average (known as LRA or locked rotor amps) with no cooling. This will heat the motor quickly until it thermally trips or burns up. This is why you will frequently see restart delays in A/C systems. For what its worth, scroll compressors have been around forever and share some of these advantages, but aren’t dominant in the industry because of the additional complexity in manufacturing. They have an additional advantage of somewhat continous output pressure, which *significantly* reduces ambient noise and vibration. They also have fewer moving parts and are generally more reliable. All of these advantages convey to standard air compressors by the way, something I'm a little surprised they didn't mention.

phnofive 5y ago
You sound like you have expertise, so could you have a look at his patents? I couldn't make much of them other than they looked familiar in some aspects and impractical/impossible in others: https://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=0&f=S&l=50&d=PTXT&RS=IN%2F%22helmreich%22&Refine=Refine+Search&Query=IN%2F%22helmreich%22+AND+IN%2F%22martin%22 https://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=... I assume that this is pretty common in trying to improve linear motors - I am trying to get my hands on a small one to drive an air pump and it's just inscrutable to me.

fernly 5y ago

If this[1] is the "Magtor" mentioned, they say nothing at all about this tech on their website, that I can find. [1] http://magtor.com/ http://magtor.com/

phnofive 5y ago
Replying elsewhere, but here's a USPTO link on the inventor: https://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-adv.htm&r=0&f=S&l=50&d=PTXT&RS=IN%2F%22helmreich%22&Refine=Refine+Search&Query=IN%2F%22helmreich%22+AND+IN%2F%22martin%22 https://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=...
jf 5y ago
From another comment in this thread, it looks like the site is: https://www.magtor.tech/ https://www.magtor.tech/
fernly 5y ago
It's magtor.tech as shown in the next post.

tuatoru 5y ago

I don't get it. This is just a solenoid. Solenoids have high "start-up" (saturation) currents. Using the inertia of the plate mass at the end of each stroke is clever though. I'd have thought a rotary electric motor connected to a rotary compressor would be quieter and easier to design the bearings for, and would operate in a more steady-state regime, so be more reliable. You also don't need the valve where the fluid from the two sides meets up, avoiding that efficiency loss. I think the latest fridges (which are also air conditioners) use rotary compression. Modern fridges and industrial electric motors have had "soft start" circuits in them for at least a decade. The start-up current thing is a non-issue.

flavius29663 5y ago
Existing fridge compressors are ridiculously reliable. They are a close circuit, self lubricating motors. My grandma's fridge from the 70s was still running strong when we threw it out a few years ago. I didn't quite understood how that new design is more reliable or serviceable? The closed compressors are literally zero maintenance. Also, the vibrations of that thing will tear itself apart quite fast, just look at their own promotional video: the pipes themselves cannot possibly last long with such vibrations: https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=471 https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=471

hamburgerwah 5y ago

Here is what will happen with this technology... nothing. The company is an IP play where they have locked up this concept in IP and will try and force it on jurisdictions by various means of legislation to ensure they can get the highest prices possible for said IP. Incumbents will resist choosing to continue with current public domain technology. In 30 years when the IP expires it might possibly come into more common use. The current IP regimes are a complete disaster and are hamstringing human progress. PS: Also scroll compressors are substantially more energy efficient than rotary and various means of staging is even more efficient yet.

joshuaissac 5y ago
> will try and force it on jurisdictions by various means of legislation Have they said this is their strategy? There are IP licensors (like ARM and the Fraunhofer Society) that sell licences to their IP without trying to force jurisdictions to adopt their technology. > Incumbents will resist choosing to continue with current public domain technology This would depend on the pricing of the IP licences and the competition within the market. If the licences are cheap enough and the market competitive enough that using this tech would provide an advantage, then incumbents would license it.
- colechristensen 5y ago
  ARM sells... "intellectual property" that I might try to come up with a distinguishing definition from the IP of "one clever idea I want a monopoly on for a while". A lot of IP boils down to an idea that you could describe in an elevator and a few good engineers could turn into a product in a few hours to a year. ARM sells things that represent... thousands? hundreds of thousands? of engineer-years. You can't just whip that up in a short time, it totally makes sense to pay someone else for their trouble to make something... but if you wanted to and had a billion dollars to spare, sure you could do it yourself. The problem with "I thought of it first" IP protections is the phenomenon of simultaneous discovery. A whole lot of ideas just have their time come, and tend to have multiple people working on them and coming to similar results in short periods. Making this a race and letting the winner sell out to groups that either want to extract rent out of the idea or to hide it in a safe to prevent competition for 30 years is not conducive to progress.

MauranKilom 5y ago

Isn't the video inaccurate about the force of current pumps near maximum compression? The power put into the system by the motor is constant throughout the entire revolution. It follows that, since the piston moves slower near maximum compression, force increases (since power = force * speed). This is also intuitively the case: You need much more force to push back the piston (against a constant motor torque) near its apex because the moment arm of the crank shaft gets smaller and smaller. Yes, at the maximum compression point the force is not well-defined. In a sense it is infinite (you could not actually turn the rotor by pushing on the piston). But certainly not zero. I'm struggling to understand what the creator might have meant instead. It's not work or power (which, again, is constant). The rotary motion works, if anything, in favor of the system, as the force gets larger with compression (past the midway point). Is there some quantity I'm missing? Maybe something to do with gas laws? I'm also skeptical about the illustration with the additional magnets to contain the magnetic field lines. As drawn, that would not work for AC as the magnetic field would be the wrong way around half the time. Maybe they just use extra iron to shape the field - but that is extremely far from being innovative and more like electrical engineering 101. It could well be that I'm missing something, but overall this video had multiple strange explanations that lower my confidence in the overall accuracy of the reporting...

Confiks 5y ago

Do note that Magtor is currently only claiming to be able to compress air, not air conditioning fluids / refrigerants. They add that "[a]lthough air compression is a first milestone for Magtor, the medium-term goal is to bring Magtor efficiencies to climate control engineering allowing products such as fridges, heat pumps and air conditioning units to become 30+% more efficient" [1]. It's hard to verify more on the design. They offer a lot of explanation and tests, but no independent review is given. Main question on YouTube about scrolling compressors (used in newer fridges) is anwered a bit vaguely [2]. The patent portfolio page is very grandiose [3] but doesn't care to link anything. A quick search doesn't turn up much to do with air or fluid compression, only "Magnet device comprising stators and translators" [4] and similar, which don't mention compression at all. [1] https://www.magtor.tech/who-we-are/ https://www.magtor.tech/who-we-are/ [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TFiL5BM3ss&lc=UgxHEJkjlZ9fZLvLz4t4AaABAg.9RLpfTDalnh9RMOMcaz2cs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TFiL5BM3ss&lc=UgxHEJkjlZ9fZ... [3] https://www.magtor.tech/intellectual-property/ https://www.magtor.tech/intellectual-property/ [4] https://patents.google.com/patent/US10943721B2 https://patents.google.com/patent/US10943721B2

nashashmi 5y ago
How can something like a rapid compressor generate SO much heat AND transfer it so quickly. Isn’t there some kind of time delay in both generation and transfer?

jedberg 5y ago

Is this just an ad for a company trying to patent their technology?

robocat 5y ago

They appear not to be developing the compressors themselves, but instead are trying to license their IP. From their ‘Who are we’ page[1], their Director of Production “oversees the production of the Magtopressor Demonstrators”, so not really production per se. The focus on worldwide patents and number of patents in the videos is also noticeable. [1] https://www.magtor.tech/who-we-are/#our-key-personnel https://www.magtor.tech/who-we-are/#our-key-personnel

woleium 5y ago

Heh, title should be "A non-revolutionary solution"

mrfusion 5y ago

Btw what’s the story with teslas octovalve? Does that add a lot of efficiency to their heat pumps?

stephen_g 5y ago
From reading some links from here, I don't think so. Despite the breathless amazement of the writers, it doesn't seem to really be an innovation in heat pumps itself, it's just doing things in a way that's much more efficient than Tesla's previous heating/cooling systems...

swamp_gas 5y ago

Some ACs are already 33% more efficient. https://www.pickhvac.com/faq/what-is-the-best-seer/ https://www.pickhvac.com/faq/what-is-the-best-seer/

gpm 5y ago

This comment by the author on youtube is worth reading: Attempt at direct linking: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TFiL5BM3ss&lc=UgzdQZ_jgrbde4i1Zs94AaABAg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2TFiL5BM3ss&lc=UgzdQZ_jgrbde... --- Context (post by Ed Williams) Most residential (and many commercial) AC units, refrigerators, heat pump and such use scroll compressors. Yes, they have a startup in rush, but I'd be interested in seeing efficiency of this tech versus current scroll compressors. --- Post by "Just Have a Think" (the creator) Response from Magtor CTO : There are many types of compressor in use and the industry somewhat specialises within particular technologies based on the power requirements, type of applications, manufacturing costs, end product costs, etc. Regarding efficiency of scroll vs reciprocating compressors, not all sources agree but the trend is that scroll compressors are at least slightly more efficient, based on operating conditions… There is this interesting white paper from Schneider Electric, “The different types of cooling compressors” https://download.schneider-electric.com/files?p_Doc_Ref=SPD_VAVR-AE7T7G_EN https://download.schneider-electric.com/files?p_Doc_Ref=SPD_... and I also found this study: “Comparison of hermetic scroll and reciprocating compressors operating under varying refrigerant charge and load” at https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=2517&context=icec https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=http...

poorjohnmacafee 5y ago

FYI this is an advert. Not just in resemblance to an infomercial but the youtube presenter is reaching out and quoting CTO of the company as responses to youtuber questions in comments.

fastball 5y ago
Fairly certain YouTube requires you to disclose paid-for adverts now.
- elil17 5y ago
  Fairly certain humans have been breaking rules almost as long as we’ve been making them.
  - fastball 5y ago
    Sure, but it would be very unlikely in this particular case, given that YT is very trigger happy when it comes to violations and YT is the main source of his livelihood.
filleokus 5y ago
I regularly watch this channel and I honestly believe his claims of independence (no revenue from any kind of sponsorships or adverts, just from Patreons). I think he simply want to be helpful for his audience and forward questions/responses if he has the chance to do so. Overall I like his content, he is usually fairly technical and realistic about the prospect of things he cover. He has also has done some deep dives in e.g how to calculate levelized cost of energy to help analyse/compare different new inovations he showcase on the channel. But sometimes I guess it can be slightly too pop-sciencey, reminding me (both in a good and bad way) of the glossy science magazines of my youth. Extrapolating barley lab bench-viable results to full scale production, with very optimistic timelines etc.
- mda 5y ago
  Even if this is not an advert, he could have done better research and put a more balanced view. Are there prior work similar to this? What are the risks for the companies approach? Will it really provide 30% better efficiency? In current form this indeed looks like an advert, whether intentional or not.

everybodyknows 5y ago

This is a variation on a long-established linear-motor compressor design, for sale in these products: https://engelcoolers.com/collections/powered-fridge-freezers https://engelcoolers.com/collections/powered-fridge-freezers Google "Sawafuji Swing Compressor".

basicplus2 5y ago

The biggest inefficiencies come from combining heating and cooling in the one unit. if you buy a airconditiiner that only cools (or only heats) it can be aything from 3 to 5 times more efficient than a reverse cycle type.

tjmc 5y ago
Can you please link to datasheets that verify this because I haven't seen these discrepancies in smaller (split) systems.

iamgopal 5y ago

Years ago, I did try to built on similar concept but instead using reluctance for further reducing hysteresis losses. Due to lower power density of such system the size of the compressor was increased by about 2 times.

ekianjo 5y ago

Protected by patents = will get no traction whatsoever.

fake-name 5y ago

How did this get a patent? This is just an linear piston pump [1][2]. You can literally buy fish tank air pumps that use this exact mechanism [3]. The only thing mildly novel here is that they're driving it both directions via magnets & more complex drive electronics. Most of the commercial versions just use a steel piston, and single-direction actuation because they can then run the electromagnet directly off mains AC to get the cycling action. 1: https://www.techmagpm.com/en/linear-piston/ https://www.techmagpm.com/en/linear-piston/ 2: https://www.nitto-kohki.eu/en/operating-principles-en/linear-piston-pumps.html https://www.nitto-kohki.eu/en/operating-principles-en/linear... 3: https://www.jehmco.com/html/central_air_pumps.html https://www.jehmco.com/html/central_air_pumps.html

baybal2 5y ago

LG been making linear piston compressors for mass market for more than a decade. The true breakthrough here will happen with solid state gas compressors. Solid state compressors already approach, or pass 50% efficiency — something only possible in very large, staged, centrifugal compressors for large AC systems. A solid state compressor, unlike that, will be equally efficient regardless the size.

SevenSigs 5y ago

if your AC is ~10 years old... just replace it and you will probably get > 33% efficiency gains

supperburg 5y ago

This is unmitigated bullshit and probably sponsored by the vapor ware company that is making this thing. Just add more insulation and some solar panels.

sargun 5y ago

Why wouldn't they use scroll compressors?

cryptonector 5y ago

There's an internal combustion engine that works on roughly the opposite as this magtor compressor: a pair of opposing pistons moving the connecting rod linearly to drive a linear electric generator. I can't remember the name of it.

hellgas00 5y ago

LG uses linear compressors in their fridges, very similar to this design and they have been out for years. They generally fail after only a few years, terrible reliability in comparison to a piston compressor.

gpapilion 5y ago
Mine failed within 5 years, and this seems to be a common thread among LG owners.

bin_bash 5y ago

I’m surprised this wasn’t about Exergyn which is far more interesting tech: https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2021/07/21/a-new-green-air-conditioning-system-manages-without-nasty-gases https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2021/07/21/...

Abishek_Muthian 5y ago
I too thought the video was about Exergyn, I was pleasantly surprised when I read the Economist coverage on them. It's not like we come across breakthrough technology which is cheaper, efficient and planet friendly. It is supposedly 30-40% cheaper than current ACs and being solid-state stack it's definitely more efficient(Not sure how it compares with the calimed efficiency of Magtor).

kova12 5y ago

Jeezus, what a bunch of wankers. Just stop screwing around and get nuclear energy prioritized already. Solve energy crisis and global warming all at the same time. Only loser is exxon-mobil, but I can live with that

elil17 5y ago

Clever design, perhaps. However, it only applies to small, residential AC. Commercial systems use more efficient designs already, such as screw compressors. Also, good luck using this with a turbine - many of the largest compressors directly driven by gas or steam turbines, which are way more efficient than electric motors because they eliminate inefficiencies associated with electric generation and distribution.

sandreas 5y ago

Well, the idea behind this solves ONE problem of the whole process... here is an alternative, that rethinks the whole process and already is used in many german projects: https://fahrenheit.cool/en/ https://fahrenheit.cool/en/

nobrains 5y ago

Analogy wise, this seems like AC (alternating current) instead of DC (direct current), but for compression motors. (Edit: But only until the unit that combines both the sides and makes it back to DC (still using analogy) back again)

TaylorAlexander 5y ago

If anyone is curious I built some brushless linear motors in 2011 and I have recently put some relevant code and background docs on GitHub. https://github.com/tlalexander/open_linear_motor https://github.com/tlalexander/open_linear_motor

atoav 5y ago

IMO the most important thing to make air conditioners more efficient is to design, build and modify buildings in such a way they do the heavy lifting passively. This means also we need to avoid building idiotic things like sun-facing glas fronts etc. We have to stop pretending we are going to save the day by making AC units (or any other thermal machine) a few percentage points more efficient — because this is peanuts and nowhere near the amount of efficiency needed to grant humanities survival on earth. The best AC unit is the one that you don't need.

KozmoNau7 5y ago
Exactly! We need more efficiency, and heat pumps/air conditioners are already very efficient at what they do. Of course further efficiency improvements are welcome, but they are small gains. We need to look at where big gains can be made, and improving the thermal efficiency and air circulation of buildings holds a lot of promise. You don't have to go full passivhaus, even just improved insulation, double/triple-layer glass, sun shades and well-placed foliage to provide shade can net much larger improvements than some tweaks to AC design.
dzhiurgis 5y ago
It's probably cheaper to put AC + solar panels in each home than rebuild all of them...
- atoav 5y ago
  Depends what costs you factor in down the line. E.g. I remember reading a study about Paris, that looked at the impact widespread AC use would have on the ambient temperature of the city. The optimistic guess was a rise of about 5°. Where I live (Central Europe) air conditions are the total exception. Adding AC to flats is rarely ever done, thermal insulation much, much more often, even in old buildings. Maybe this is because the winters also get cold so thermal insulation has the extra pro of reducing the heating bill.
  - dzhiurgis 5y ago
    AC is somewhat cheap of source of heat in winter too, provided your system is scaled enough.

toxik 5y ago

Interesting nerdsnipe. Tell people (incorrectly) how an AC system works, then segue into a full-blown ad piece for some "new" tech.

timonoko 5y ago

Apropos: Helsinki has never experienced heatwave longer than 5 days (above 25°C). Last summer it was phucking 45 days. However the bottom temperature of the near-by Baltic Sea is -4°C. I know this because I was hunting for halibut. There is already a separate system which refrigerates government offices from the Baltic Sea. I would suggest is to use the system to cool all homes by using the central heating system. All you need is lower is temperature to 15°C in those pipes.

ajnin 5y ago
What would be the impact of all that heat on sea life and fishing activities ? Also, as we tend to learn the hard way, natural resources are finite. How big of a heatsink is the bottom of the Baltic sea ? For how long could you cool all of Helsinki's homes per, say 1˚C temperature increase ?
- timonoko 5y ago
  No worry. All life in the the deeps is all ready gone. This is because of lack of oxygen and some chemicals, like phosphors mostly from from agriculture.

Gravityloss 5y ago

One point in the presentation is not correct. This is instead correct: the maximum force occurs at minimum speed at the top and bottom of the stroke. The minimum force and maximum speed of piston occur mid-stroke. https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=284 https://youtu.be/2TFiL5BM3ss?t=284

LeifCarrotson 5y ago
You have to distinguish between the available force that the constant-torque motor is able to produce and the actual force that is exerted on the working fluid by the piston. Yes, the crankshaft confers the greatest mechanical advantage at the top and bottom of the stroke; that's an excellent observation. The position vs time plot of a crankshaft follows a sine wave, the velocity (as a derivative of position) follows a cosine, and the acceleration available from a constant input torque follows the derivative of the position, again a sine wave. However, this available force does not meant that the exerted force at the top of the stroke is high, as it needs a reactive force to work against. This force is mostly provided by the fluid pressure, rather than by a velocity-dependent force like friction. At the top of stroke, the gas is not under significant compression, so it takes minimal force to move the piston. Near the bottom of the stroke, when the gas is maximally compressed, there is maximum force on the piston. When the pressure exceeds the output of the compressor, the air begins to exit through the check valve. Another complicating factor is that there are typically two pistons on the same crankshaft, so as the piston returns the gas remaining in the cylinder is working with the motor. The final and most complicated part of the problem is that the whole point is that the gas being compressed is not an ideal Hooke's law spring where PV = constant, it's undergoing adibatic compression, where P x V x gamma = constant, where gamma is the specific heat of the refrigerant, and the temperature changes through the compression. You can improve your intuitive understanding of these relationships with an ordinary bike pump and the bike's pedals. When the pump is fully up, there's little resistance, you can feel the force increase when it's almost at the bottom, and you can feel and hear the air going into the tire for a short length of the stroke at the bottom. Likewise, pushing vertically on the pedals (avoid pushing forward or pawing backwards) does the same thing as a crankshaft.

smnscu 5y ago

The fact that the video wasn't from Technology Connections was both surprising and disappointing. Great share though! I wish ACs and heat pumps were more common in the UK, though I understand why they aren't (yet! I expect an AC installing craze in the next couple of years).

adflux 5y ago

I have a single hose AC (renting right now). did some research on how to improve the efficiency of the unit. I ran into this report by the australian government: https://www.energyrating.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-06/decision-ris-air-conditioners.pdf https://www.energyrating.gov.au/sites/default/files/2020-06/... Adding a second hose to a single hose AC can improve effiency by around 100%... This is because portable air conditioners are tested differently to other air conditioners. "The DoE found the addition of a second duct that uses outdoor air to cool the condenser would yield an efficiency gain of 103 per cent for a retail price increase of around US$8 (from US$534 to US$542)—a price/efficiency ratio of 1:103 (i.e. a one per cent increase in price provides a 103 per cent increase in efficiency). Because double duct portables are no longer available on the Australian and New Zealand markets, suppliers are unable to communicate their benefits compared with single duct products. The existing energy efficiency regulations on portable air conditioners appear to have had the perverse effect of removing the more energy efficient product (double duct portables) from the market, while encouraging the marketing of single duct portables, by allowing unverified claims to be made about the effectiveness and efficiency of these products. This RIS considers options to resolve this perverse situatio" "The single duct portable’s performance information is likely to have been obtained from a test that measured the cold air produced. Fixed air conditioners, conversely, are tested to measure their cooling effect on an enclosed space. While a single duct portable may blow cold air onto a person, if its performance was tested in the same way as a fixed air conditioner, it could have a net heating effect on the room it was supposed to cool."

thorin 5y ago

Live in areas that don't need air conditioning :-) Coming from UK / Europe I'm always surprised by the number of people in the US and of course Asia that are totally dependent on aircon.

oblio 5y ago
Yup, let's abandon 10-20% of the globe, and maybe 30% soon, as global warming ramps up. That's going to be quick, easy and politically viable.
- thorin 5y ago
  Maybe forcing buildings to be created in such a way to minimize aircon and be more energy efficient would be helpful rather than relying on powered devices to fix the problem in place. I could deal with the 1 or 2 weeks a year it might be might to nice to have aircon where I live. Building in excessively Dubai for example seems crazy to me.
  - oblio 5y ago
    I agree with you, but the global tendency is towards bigger and harder to heat/cool houses, spread apart (so again, no shared heating/cooling), whenever living standards improve. People seem to be living in crowded cities just because they're forced (jobs are nearby, apartments are generally cheaper than apartments because they're generally smaller, etc). Desert environment should definitely be super high density and possibly largely underground in my opinion. Things don't seem to be moving that way, though.
    - thorin 5y ago
      I'd struggle to live somewhere where you have to spend most of your time indoors in and air conditioned environment anyway, but this doesn't seem to bother a lot of people, I guess they are used to it. If we carry on this way maybe colonizing other planets won't seem so bad...

uCantCauseUCant 5y ago

The answers is - reservoirs.. earth cools itself at night, we need to pump the heat into the night sky and store the cold in salt reservoirs.

robbmorganf 5y ago

I'll give it to them that the solution is an elegant reduction in parts count. It's just a shame that they compare it to a straw man and exaggerate the benefits. "It solves this problem, and this one, and this one" but modern compressors don't suffer most of those. Other sibling comments have good specific qualms, so I won't duplicate them. That said, I'm glad people play around with new designs. That's how innovation works. I just wish investors would be satisfied with "we're trying a reasonable alternative design to look at benefits" rather than requiring "the old design is a dinosaur, and our design solves every problem under the sun"

xondono 5y ago

I don't understand what is innovative or new about this, and I'm highly dubious of the quoted numbers. "33% more efficient" is repeated in several company documents and videos, but I can't find the baseline for that measurement.

_nalply 5y ago

Additionally air conditioners should transfer heat to tap water, not outside air. Water as a medium to discard heat is more efficient. There are downsides to this: wasted tap water and hot sewers. Probably certain municipalities should disallow such air conditioner water heaters except to make hot water for showering and bathing. Also see: https://www.hotspotenergy.com/air-conditioner-water-heaters/ACWH-FAQ.php https://www.hotspotenergy.com/air-conditioner-water-heaters/...

londons_explore 5y ago

For efficient AC and heat pump systems, we need to invent a compressor which is close-to isothermal rather than close-to adiabatic. And we need to switch to pressure change rather than phase change systems. That pretty much means the compressor needs to be built into the 'condensor'. The closest we get to today is two stage compressors - where you compress a bit, cool the gas, then compress some more. But we need to get to 50 stage compressors - where we compress slightly, then cool, and repeat. Also, we will need to switch out the pressure regulating orifice for a turboexpander to recuperate the energy which would otherwise be lost letting something high pressure become low pressure. All these add complexity and cost, but ultimately will be needed to make efficient enough systems when energy is more expensive in a carbon-free world.